World Keeper

Chapter 1067: Unseen Threats

Clover continued to chase after the first monster, and managed to learn a few things from its performance. First, its primary power was to take control of others and force them to fight it. In order to do this, it needed confirmation of their identity. He confirmed this when he came to a scene of an engineer wielding a large wrench and swinging it at the monster, as opposed to running like everyone else. This engineer, most notably, had a name tag visible on his jacket.

Its secondary power allowed it to take control of attacks that would be fatal to the monster itself from affected targets, turning them back towards the wielder. Earlier, this had caused the rifle fire to turn back in midair, and with the engineer it made his wrench slip out of his hands, almost striking his own head.

Thankfully, Clover reacted in time, throwing out a punch of spatial ki with his shattering intent. This was dangerous to use inside, but he was in a hurry. The wrench was sucked into a shattered space and disappeared, while Clover launched himself forward to the monster, using his claws to tear through its midsection. There was no warning against attacking the monster himself, so he was confident that this would work. 

He saw the cartoon figure of the monster fall in two halves, its eyes transformed into x’s, and took a deep breath. This one doesn’t seem to be able to interfere with doors, so that one should be on Lydia’s end. With that thought in mind, it turned to rush towards the area that Lydia had been assigned, but kept in mind to strictly continue to follow the commands that had previously been issued.

Lydia clicked her tongue within her helmet as she arrived at another door that wouldn’t open. The monster that she was currently hunting took the form of an amorphous black blob with a single, red eye at its center. She had only managed to see it twice, both times before it passed through another door to escape from her.

Any door that the creature passed through would no longer open automatically. Lydia didn’t know what would happen if the door was manually opened, but she knew that it wouldn’t be good. Perhaps it would lead to somewhere else, or cause the person passing through to simply disappear. Going by the large number of missing person reports, these two appeared to be the most likely scenarios.

The problem was that every time the monster took a door, she had to find an alternate route to catch up with it. If the monster wasn’t slow to travel in tight spaces, it could have made it through the entire ship by this point.

I could just cut open my own path, if I need to. The thought was certainly tempting, a pair of black blades growing out of the arms of her suit. She just didn’t know if that would count as ‘manually opening a door’ by the monster’s rules.

Gritting her teeth, she turned and ran to the side, knowing that there was another route to the other side of this door only three doors down. Anyone who saw her quickly got out of her way, understanding the urgency of the situation.

After passing through two more doors, she found herself face-to-eye with the monster. The pupil of the creature dilated as it stared at her, seeming surprised that she had cut it off. Lydia didn’t give it a chance to do anything else, slicing vertically through the only solid mass that appeared in its body, the eye.

Seeing the creature falling to the ground with a light thud, Lydia let out a sigh of relief. Turning her head, she prepared to go meet up with Clover and see how his own fight had progressed, only to see him rushing down the hall towards her. She waved at him, but didn’t speak, and neither did he.

“Shall we check out the bridge, Lydia?” Lydia asked Clover, remembering the instruction to only accept communications when using the opposite names. Clover nodded his head, turning to lead the way.

There was still chaos within the ship, everyone scrambling to fix any issues that had been caused by the intrusion of the memetic monsters. Thankfully, the ship kept moving throughout the fight, so they weren’t being raided by even more.

When they came to the bridge, they saw a bloody sight unfold. The entirety of the bridge crew was dead, seemingly killed by the captain, before the captain took his own life. Shocked, Clover ran over to the captain, seeing the Security Manual open in his hand. On its exposed page, he saw the same warnings that the captain had previously given Clover and Lydia, followed by a line of bold text.

“Your bridge crew is already infected, and beyond saving.” Clover read the text out loud. “Set an automatic course to return home after thirty minutes. If any infected members survive the return journey, there is a ninety-eight percent chance that at least one of the monsters will be reborn from their memories.”

After that, another two paragraphs were written. “This entry is for Clover and Lydia Kyr. Presumably, you will have the chance to read this after the situation appears resolved. Do not be mistaken. There is a third entity. This third entity is invisible to electronic monitoring, so your suit cannot perceive it. Despite this, you must not remove your suit, or you will be infected.”

“You should have roughly twenty minutes at this point. You must locate the monster by using context clues such as the gazes of others or claw marks on the floor or walls. After which, order a Code 9 Quarantine within the ship. This text will be preserved as evidence. Good luck.”

Clover looked at Lydia, and she could tell through the displayed emoticon that he was worried. A Code 9 Quarantine meant that everyone on the ship would be detained individually for one week in isolation rooms upon their return.

“This is so not what we signed up for.” Lydia grumbled in discontent. Her blades reformed, and she turned to face the door, scanning the walls with her visor. “Any ideas, Lydia?”

Clover paused. “I didn’t notice anyone reacting as if there was something invisible around me on my trip here.” After he said that, his eyes widened. He walked over to the communication terminal, brushing aside the body leaning against it, and activated a ship-wide message. “All crew, immediately proceed to your quarters. The ship is now on auto-pilot. This is an emergency. Proceed to your quarters, and do not emerge for any reason until we arrive back at our station. Anyone seen wandering the halls after five minutes will be assumed to be controlled by a memetic entity and will be terminated on sight.”

After he sent that message, he turned to the computer. Every ship had an unawakened artificial intelligence, smart enough to accept voice commands without being truly aware. “Computer.  After the crew has entered their rooms, close and magnetically lock their doors. Put all other doors in automatic mode. If any crew member dies within the quarters for any reason, report the crew member and location. If any door opens without visible cause, report the location of the door. As of this moment, I am assuming the highest level of authority due to the death of all command staff.”

“Understood.” The computer replied in a monotonous voice. Lydia seemed impressed by the idea. This would make it so that they weren’t able to use as many context clues to find the monster’s exact position, but it would make it so that they could more easily find its general location. There were multiple methods to use to attack, once they had that information.

Clover clenched his fists at his sides, waiting for the crew to complete their isolation. Soon, the computer spoke up. “All visible crew members are within the quarters. The door to the mess hall has opened without probable cause.”

The two immediately turned, ready to fight at a moment’s notice as they ran down the hall. “Lydia, how is he using the doors without being detected on the electronic monitors?” Lydia asked, to which Clover quickly responded.

“There are only three methods for a creature like that to get around. The first is air vents, which are too small for us to do anything about if it was capable of using them. Secondly, there is the possibility of following others through doors. However, as it is only invisible to electronic sensors, people would still see it following them. The third method is that it has either realized how to use the consoles with each door, or has the ability to interfere with electronic locks.”

“The manual warned us that this is an infectious creature, so it is possible that any crew member could become a new host. The Code 9 Quarantine, in my opinion, is a hint that this thing can be reborn from memories of those infected. Most likely, the captain saw something like this happening, the security teams fighting an invisible threat, and then one of them dying and disappearing while the battle continued.”

“So, the reason you magnetically sealed all of the doors…” Lydia began, eyes wide as Clover nodded.

“If we kill it, we will likely receive a notification that one of the crew members has died of unknown causes. Since the rooms are magnetically sealed, it shouldn’t be able to escape before we return.” As Clover said that, they received another notification that a hallway door had opened just outside the mess hall.

The two were close, only one door away from that hall. “Stay behind me.” Clover told Lydia as they ran through the final door. Clover didn’t know which side of the door the monster ended on, whether it had passed through or stayed on the original side. Therefore, he had to completely eliminate both possibilities.

Lydia fell back, letting Clover throw out a punch with spatial ki that filled the hallway. The sounds of something shattering and reforming filled their senses. Clover paused, standing and listening, until the computer issued a report. “Agent Freeman has perished within his quarters. Agent Julius has perished within his quarters. Agent Larson has perished within his quarters.”

Clover’s eyes shook beneath his helmet, and he saw Lydia looking at him. “Either there were multiple creatures… or it can multiply itself through rebirth. Either way, there could be more of them by now.”

A pneumatic hiss could be heard behind them, followed by the computer’s voice. “Door 2 of Sector A-4 has been opened without visual cause.”

Before Clover could say anything, Lydia turned, blindly extending her blades into the doorway behind her. Two more reports came in of dead crew members. “I hate this thing.” Lydia muttered, finally understanding why the captain hadn’t hesitated to kill every member of the command staff when he heard that they had been infected, including himself. If he had waited, more than a dozen of these creatures would have been born.”

Unfortunately, the creature wasn’t even visible after its death, and Lydia simply heard the dull thud of a body hitting the ground in front of her. She walked backwards, keeping her eyes on the door that repeatedly tried to close, every time crunching against an unseen object. “Door 2 of Sector A-4 will not close.” The computer reported.

“Let’s go to another room, Lydia.” Lydia herself said, and they made their way to another nearby room, a security office with only one door. Once they were inside, Lydia moved Clover to the far wall, and then slashed at the empty space of the room to ensure that they were alone.

“Now, we just need to wait and see if we hear about any more unwarranted doors opening.” Clover muttered. “Computer, begin Code 9 Quarantine protocols.” He ordered, wanting to make sure that this was carried out before they returned. “Mark all five previously reported deaths as high-priority containment. Furthermore, record the following instructions. No security personnel should be allowed aboard the ship without the aid of Information Bypass devices. All doors must be monitored when passing through. Any door opening without cause must be immediately fired upon.”

“You think that they’ll survive coming back through the barrier?” Lydia asked, though Clover didn’t answer. Partially because she didn’t follow the protocol to use her own name, but more because he didn’t know himself. The barrier could definitely inflict serious harm on the memetic monsters, enough to deter them from entering, and even kill some of them. However, there was still the risk that a monster brought through via a ship would be able to withstand the damage enough to survive. Thus, these rather extensive precautions were necessary.